Fire at illegal market In India kills at least 19

KOLKATA, India (AP) ? A fire broke out at an illegal six-story plastics market in the Indian city of Kolkata early Wednesday, killing at least 19 people, police said.

The blaze, which started before 4 a.m., was likely caused by a short circuit, said West Bengal fire minister Javed Khan. The fire was under control by mid-morning, he said, but toxic gases being released by the blaze were hampering rescue efforts.

A police official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media, said at least 19 people had died. He said police were looking for the owner of the building, which was filled with dozens of small shops selling various plastic products.

Another 10 people were hospitalized in critical condition and the death toll was expected to rise, Khan said.

He called the scene of the fire "an illegal, unauthorized market."

However, local residents said the market had been operating in the building for nearly 40 years. They said there was only one entrance to the building, which made rescue efforts difficult.

The building housed several warehouses on its upper floors where chemicals, paper and plastics were stored.

Police said the victims were porters working in the market who also slept there at night. Eighteen of the dead were men.

Mamata Banerjee, the state's top elected official, visited the site soon after the blaze was brought under control and ordered the building's owners to install fire safety equipment within two months.

Banerjee said the previous government that ruled the state for more than three decades had allowed the building to operate without any permits or safety measures.

She said she has ordered police, firefighters and the city administration to file a report on the cause of the blaze and take steps to prevent the recurrence of such fires.

In December 2011, at least 93 people died in a fire in a hospital in Kolkata. Soon after that, Banerjee promised that her government would crack down on lax safety procedures in public buildings.

Safety regulations are routinely ignored in India, where fire escapes and evacuation drills are rare. Even if fire extinguishers are present, they are almost never serviced.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fire-illegal-market-india-kills-least-19-073306782.html

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Three killed, seven injured in Swiss workplace shooting

ZURICH (Reuters) - Three people, including the suspected assailant, have been killed in a shooting at a factory near the Swiss city of Lucerne, police said on Wednesday.

Seven others were injured in the attack which happened just after 9 a.m. (0800 GMT) at a wood processing company in the town of Menznau, west of Lucerne, the police said in a statement.

Emergency services were at the scene and the area had been cordoned off. A news conference is due at 2 p.m. (1300 GMT).

Last month, a gunman killed three women and injured two men in the Swiss village of Daillon, stirring a debate about Switzerland's firearm laws that allow men to keep guns after their mandatory military service.

There is no national gun register but some estimates indicate that at least one in every three of Switzerland's 8 million inhabitants keeps a gun, many stored at home. Citizens outside the military can apply for a permit to purchase up to three weapons from the age of 18 in a country where sharp shooting and hunting are popular sports.

A shooting in the Zug regional parliament in 2001, in which 14 people were killed, prompted calls to tighten laws, but the majority of Swiss citizens rejected a proposal in 2011 for extra measures such as lock-ups for guns outside service periods.

(Reporting by Emma Thomasson; Editing by Louise Ireland)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/three-killed-seven-injured-shooting-swiss-factory-124134215.html

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The Case Against Working at Home

Are you sure working from home is such a good idea?

Photo by Ingram Publishing

Elsewhere in Slate, Farhad Manjoo argues that Marissa Mayer is wrong.

I completely get the utopian fantasy of working from home: the baby napping in his crib in the next room, the gold light filtering in through the window, a tagine made with vegetables from the farmers market simmering on the stove, while you are answering emails and brainstorming ideas, the dream of modern connected life. But is that the way it really works out?

Or, in fact, is eight-tenths of your attention during a pressing work call focused on whether the clamoring hooligans in the next room are going to agitate for something, or burst in, or stay quiet?? Is a large unmapped portion of your brain engaged in trivial domestic calculations: Did I remember to pay the cable bill? Is it time to change the laundry and put it into the dryer? Is your attention, in truth, divided, conquered? (And let?s be honest: The reason we want to work at home is that we want our attention to be divided.)

As a professor and writer, who works both from home and office, I don?t feel hugely qualified to comment on matters of corporate policy. But in the recent hullabaloo over Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer?s decision to stop allowing employees to work from home, I do wonder about all the righteous insistence that we should tear down the walls, break down the barriers, and all toil away in our bathtubs. I don't entirely buy the line that domestic life can hum on unfettered around us as we are all concentrating like Tolstoy on the task at hand.?

People argue that they can work just as efficiently, or more efficiently from home, but efficiency is not the only measure of whether working at home is a good idea. Is it possible that our ideas, our creativity, our wilder bursts of thought are often, or at least sometimes better achieved outside the home, in a more neutral space? I know from experience that it?s not that simple to transport your work thoughts into your house. I know what it is like to carry a laptop to a coffee shop, just to shake free of the clutter of home thoughts. One of the great thinkers on work-life conditions, Virginia Woolf, argued that our ideas themselves are subtly, but importantly, affected by the mundane, material conditions surrounding us. In A Room of One?s Own, she talks about the intangible but crucial effect on one?s concentration and quality of thought of things as seemingly superficial or irrelevant as a meal. She wrote that our ideas ?are attached to grossly material things, like health and money and the houses we live in.?

Of course those who have spent a lot of time working at home will recognize that being in your pajamas, in your bed, seeing little sticky handprints that you should really clean up, remembering an argument you had the night before in that same room, creates a different state of mind than the office state of mind. One of the reasons that the office must have been invented is to banish for a little while that home self, to get away from her and her preoccupations.?

In this weirdly emotional debate, we should at least be willing to admit that something is lost and something is gained from working at home. That the comfort and flexibility are counteracted by certain constrictions on the imagination, by a competition of focus, even by the relaxation and familiarity of home. In one of the places I work, there were cries this week that Mayer is ?draconian? in suggesting that her employees should drag themselves into the office, but to me it doesn't seem outrageous or draconian or Mussolini-like that a certain employer might choose to have her employees work in the office.

It seems instead that the dreamers of the technological dream have already gotten what they wanted; they have already achieved the perfect, ominous mingling of our attention: No matter where we work, whether the commute is to an office or the kitchen table, the line between our professional lives and our homes have basically been obliterated. You can be in bed with a boyfriend and emailing your boss, reading a child to sleep and fielding a text from your assistant. The separation between ?home? and ?work? is largely fictional as it is. It seems sometimes that our persistent, if silly, fantasy of ?having it all? often translates into having it all in the same minute. Which is to say that there are currently very few spaces you can go where your work cannot find you, very few moments where you are not available to both work and home. Rather than desperately pursuing the any further mingling, the separation of work and life might in fact be something to strive for or long for, something rare and more precious than we think.

Those up in arms about Mayer?s disrespect for ?the work-life balance? should consider this possibility: ?The work-life balance? might be best served by keeping work at work. By trying to pursue that tiny sliver of a chance of keeping the office and the thousands of meaningless work details and memos and preoccupations out of your home. ???

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=b1585f3ea9ec662a5d42cc52c0fc2691

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Silver nanoparticles may adversely affect environment

Thursday, February 28, 2013

In experiments mimicking a natural environment, Duke University researchers have demonstrated that the silver nanoparticles used in many consumer products can have an adverse effect on plants and microorganisms.

Fifty days after scientists applied a single low dose of silver nanoparticles, the experimental environments produced about a third less biomass in some plants and microbes.

These preliminary findings are important, the researchers said, because little is known about the environmental effects of silver nanoparticles, which are found in textiles, clothing, children's toys and pacifiers, disinfectants and toothpaste.

"No one really knows what the effects of these particles are in the environment," said Benjamin Colman, a post-doctoral fellow in Duke's biology department and a member of the Center for the Environmental Implications of Nanotechnology (CEINT).

"We're trying to come up with the data that can be used to help regulators determine the risks to the environment from silver nanoparticle exposures," Colman said. CEINT's research is funded by the National Science Foundation and the Environmental Protection Agency

Previous studies have involved high concentrations of the nanoparticles in a laboratory setting, which the researchers point out, doesn't represent "real-world" conditions.

"Results from laboratory studies are difficult to extrapolate to ecosystems, where exposures likely will be at low concentrations and there is a diversity of organisms," Colman said.

Silver nanoparticles are used in consumer products because they can kill bacteria, inhibiting unwanted odors. They work through a variety of mechanisms, including generating free radicals of oxygen which can cause DNA damage to microbial membranes without harming human cells.

The main route by which these particles enter the environment is as a by-product of sewage treatment plants. The nanoparticles are too small to be filtered out, so they and other materials end up in the resulting wastewater treatment "sludge," which is then spread on the land surface as a fertilizer.

For their studies, the researchers created mesocosms, which are small, man-made structures containing different plants and microorganisms meant to represent the environment. They applied sludge with low doses of silver nanoparticles in some of the mesocosms, then compared plants and microorganisms from treated and untreated mesocosms after 50 days.

The study appeared online Feb. 27 in the journal PLOS One.

The researchers found that one of the plants studied, a common annual grass known as Microstegium vimeneum, had 32 percent less biomass in the mesocosms treated with the nanoparticles. Microbes were also affected by the nanoparticles, Colman said. One enzyme associated with helping microbes deal with external stresses was 52 percent less active, while another enzyme that helps regulate processes within the cell was 27 percent less active. The overall biomass of the microbes was also 35 percent lower, he said.

"Our field studies show adverse responses of plants and microorganisms following a single low dose of silver nanoparticles applied by a sewage biosolid," Colman said. "An estimated 60 percent of the average 5.6 million tons of biosolids produced each year is applied to the land for various reasons, and this practice represents an important and understudied route of exposure of natural ecosystems to engineered nanoparticles."

"Our results show that silver nanoparticles in the biosolids, added at concentrations that would be expected, caused ecosystem-level impacts," Colman said. "Specifically, the nanoparticles led to an increase in nitrous oxide fluxes, changes in microbial community composition, biomass, and extracellular enzyme activity, as well as species-specific effects on the above-ground vegetation."

The researchers plan to continue to study longer-term effects of silver nanoparticles and to examine another ubiquitous nanoparticle ? titanium dioxide.

###

Duke University: http://www.duke.edu

Thanks to Duke University for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

This press release has been viewed 33 time(s).

Source: http://www.labspaces.net/127060/Silver_nanoparticles_may_adversely_affect_environment

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Video: Brothers? passion for music a South Side inspiration

>>> finally tonight, most mentions of the city of chicago of late have, sadly, concerned gun violence, but tonight we have a story about two brothers enjoying a lot of success and showing some kids something they never thought possible. the mcgill brothers are among a group of 100 african-americans featured on our nbc news website, thegrio.com, and tonight ron allen has their story.

>> reporter: passion and artistry lift the mcgill brothers to lofty heights. demarre plays lead flute with the seattle symphony . kid brother anthony is the principal clarinettist for the world-renowned new york metropolitan opera . rising stars in the rarefied world of classical music , where just 4% of the musicians in national orchestras are african-american or latino. why classical music ?

>> i was drawn to the stories that i heard as a kid, musical stories, and my imagination would just go wild.

>> when i was listening to an orchestra or i was playing the clarinet, somehow, it got deeper into my soul.

>> reporter: they started on the south side of chicago , known for its urban problems, not the classics.

>> hi, sweetheart!

>> reporter: parents ira, a retired teacher, and demarre sr., a former firefighter, say they mortgaged the house five times to pay for lessons.

>> the pads look good.

>> reporter: they still have demarre's first flute and a little something he scribbled down when he was just 15.

>> "goals for the future, to be the best artist in the world

>> wlfer they perform on stage, it's almost like you forget to breathe.

>> reporter: they attribute their success to a chicago non-profit that's been offering free lessons to inner city kids after school since 1979 , the merit school, where they're now treated like rock stars .

>> they provided us a community of people that look like us doing the same thing.

>> reporter: they won competitions, scholarships to prestigious schools, and at age 14 and 18, performed in a very special neighborhood.

>> bravo, gentlemen.

>> reporter: where's the rivalry? all siblings have rivalries. who got better grades in school?

>> oh, see, well, there you go.

>> you probably did.

>> me.

>> reporter: now their goal is to inspire. and share their love of music.

>> it brings feelings to you and it helps you express yourself .

>> reporter: while taking their place among the great musicians of their time. ron allen , nbc news,

Source: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/nightly-news/50964613/

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Larkin leads No. 5 Miami past Virginia Tech 76-58

Miami's Shane Larkin (0) tries to steal the ball from Virginia Tech's Erick Green (11) during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game in Coral Gables, Fla., Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter)

Miami's Shane Larkin (0) tries to steal the ball from Virginia Tech's Erick Green (11) during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game in Coral Gables, Fla., Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter)

Virginia Tech's Joey van Zegeren (2) shoots between Miami's Kenny Kadji and Reggie Johnson (42) during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game in Coral Gables, Fla., Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter)

Miami head coach Jim Larranaga reacts to a penalty call during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game against Virginia Tech in Coral Gables, Fla., Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter)

Virginia Tech's Robert Brown (1) and Miami's Shane Larkin (0) go for a loose ball during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game in Coral Gables, Fla., Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter)

Virginia Tech's C.J. Barksdale (42) loses a rebound to Miami's Kenny Kadji (35) during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game in Coral Gables, Fla., Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2013. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter)

CORAL GABLES, Fla. (AP) ? An hour before tip-off, several Miami Hurricanes stretching on the court craned their necks toward the scoreboard to watch a few of this season's video highlights. Then they made some more.

Shane Larkin scored 22 points and played smothering defense on Erick Green to help the Hurricanes bounce back from a loss and beat Virginia Tech 76-58 Wednesday night.

Despite a slow start, Miami (23-4, 14-1 Atlantic Coast Conference) never trailed and improved to 13-0 at home. The Hurricanes hold a 2?-game edge over second-place Duke in the ACC and can clinch their first conference basketball championship by beating the Blue Devils on Saturday.

"It's just another game on the schedule," Larkin said before he and his teammates dissolved in laughter that acknowledged the comment as nonsense.

"It's going to be a blast," guard Trey McKinney Jones said. "We beat them here this year, and we beat them there last year, so they're going to be gunning for our heads."

Miami shook a 10-day scoring slump just in time for Duke. The Hurricanes were coming off a loss at Wake Forest that ended their 14-game winning streak and their bid to go unbeaten in the ACC, and they went 11 minutes without a basket early against Virginia Tech before pulling away.

"A lot of people wanted to see how we would respond to a loss," Larkin said. "I think we came out and imposed our will."

Virginia Tech (12-16, 3-12) fell deeper into last place in the league. Green, the nation's leading scorer at 25.2 points per game, took a painful spill in the first half and scored only 16 ? just the third time this season he has been held below 20.

The Hurricanes had averaged only 54.7 points over their past three games and again sputtered at the outset, but led 15-14 despite committing five consecutive turnovers and missing seven straight shots.

The Hokies were having trouble scoring, too.

"We weren't able to capitalize on the offensive end," Virginia Tech coach James Johnson said, "and they're too good of a team to hold down for long periods of time. We needed to take advantage of the opportunity we had."

Then the onslaught began against Tech, an 18-point underdog.

Larkin led the way, and not only because of his defense. On consecutive possessions early in the second half, the point guard hit a one-handed runner, sank a 3-pointer and fed Durand Scott for a fast-break layup and a 49-28 lead.

"We had no answer for him," Johnson said. "He's the key to that team."

Kenny Kadji had 20 points, six rebounds and two blocks, while Trey McKinney Jones added 11 points and three steals. Scott, a senior, was held out of the starting lineup for disciplinary reasons. He missed the first 4 minutes and scored nine points.

Larkin shot 8 for 12, including 3 of 5 from 3-point range, and had six assists.

"Shane had a terrific all-around game," coach Jim Larranaga said.

The Hurricanes made 50 percent and went 8 for 21 beyond the arc. They also made 22 of 30 free throws and won a league home game by at least 18 points for the fifth time this year.

"We did a good job driving the ball trying to get to the basket," Kadji said. "People are now playing us more like a jump-shooting team, and Shane and Durand do a good job of getting to the basket."

Green gave the Hokies a scare when he hurt his left side losing the ball and falling in the first half. He went to the bench grimacing but popped a pill and was back in the game a minute later.

Green shot 6 for 13, including just one 3-pointer, and had three turnovers.

"They did a really good job on him," Johnson said. "They trapped him off ball screens, sent two guys at him and did a really good job."

Virginia Tech shot 3 for 16 from 3-point range.

The Hurricanes scored on their first five possessions to grab a 9-2 lead. After their offense stalled, they launched a 23-5 run that included 10 points on the final four possessions of the first half for a 38-19 lead.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/347875155d53465d95cec892aeb06419/Article_2013-02-27-BKC-T25-Virginia-Tech-Miami/id-a19ebae73b3a47399d1136b257d05df7

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Researchers identify genetic variation behind acute myeloid leukemia treatment success

Researchers identify genetic variation behind acute myeloid leukemia treatment success

Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Researchers from the College of Pharmacy and Medical School working within the Masonic Cancer Center, University of Minnesota, have partnered to identify genetic variations that may help signal which acute myeloid leukemia (AML) patients will benefit or not benefit from one of the newest antileukemic agents.

Their study is published today in Clinical Cancer Research.

In the latest study, U of M researchers evaluated how inherited genetic polymorphisms in CD33, a protein that naturally occurs in most leukemia cells, could affect clinical outcomes of patients treated with an existing chemotherapy drug, gemtuzumab ozogamicin (GO), an immuno-conjugate between anti-CD33 antibody and a cytotoxin known as calicheamicin, which binds to CD33 on leukemic cells. As GO is internalized by leukemia cells, the cytotoxin is released, causing DNA damage and generating leukemic cell death.

In recent clinical trials GO has been shown to induce remission and improve survival in subset of patients with AML, however there is wide inter-patient variation in response.

Jatinder Lamba, Ph.D., and colleagues identified and evaluated three genetic variations of CD33 in two groups of patients with pediatric AML ? one group that received the drug GO, and one group that did not. They found that specific genetic variation in CD33 that significantly affected the clinical outcome of AML patients who received GO based chemotherapy.

"Understanding how genetics play a role in how drugs work is extremely useful, particularly for a drug like GO which has shown a very heterogeneous response in AML patients," said Jatinder Lamba, Ph.D., the study's lead author and a researcher who holds appointments in both the College of Pharmacy and the Masonic Cancer Center, University of Minnesota. "Our latest findings lead us to believe that genetic variation in CD33 influences how AML patients' leukemic cell responds to GO."

AML is a cancer of the blood and bone marrow, and is the second most common form of leukemia in children. Though the most common type of treatment for AML is chemotherapy, Lamba says the disease remains hard to treat and newer, more effective therapies are needed.

"The overall goal of our study was to use genetic data to predict beneficial or adverse response to a specific drug, thus opening up opportunities to use this information for drug optimization to achieve maximum therapeutic efficacy and minimum toxicity. Our hope is that our research could serve as a marker of prognostic significance for clinicians to select the therapy that has the greatest odds of being effective for individual patients based on their CD33 genotype."

###

University of Minnesota Academic Health Center: http://www.ahc.umn.edu/

Thanks to University of Minnesota Academic Health Center for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

This press release has been viewed 33 time(s).

Source: http://www.labspaces.net/127037/Researchers_identify_genetic_variation_behind_acute_myeloid_leukemia_treatment_success

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E-Commerce Accounting FAQs, Part 1

Published on February 27th, 2013 by David Callaway

About the Author David Callaway is the Bigcommerce Brand Champion. He is the bearer of good news, sharer of e-commerce wisdom and digital high-fiver of Bigcommerce clients. He is also very tall.

Accounting. It?s one of the least glamorous e-commerce topics, but one of the most important ? especially for small businesses who keep their own books. To help you get a handle on your accounting and taxes (April 15 is less than two months away!), we teamed up with our friends at Webgility to get some answers to frequently asked QuickBooks and accounting questions from QuickBooks Pro Advisor Jim Savage. You can follow Jim on Twitter for more tips and info.

Which version of QuickBooks is right for my business?

This is one of the questions I?m asked most often by small business owners. There are a lot of options out there. If you?re looking for a cloud-based solution, there?s QuickBooks Online. If you have a Mac, QuickBooks Mac is a must. And even if you decide to go with the desktop software, you still have to choose between the Pro, Premier and Enterprise versions. Check out Intuit?s full product list with pricing to get an idea of your options.

To help get the ball rolling on your decision, here are some of the main differences:

There are many other factors to consider based on the nature and needs of your business. If you?re still having trouble picking the right software for you, I recommend consulting a QuickBooks Pro Advisor in your area. He or she should be able to take a look at your company and work with you to decide which will best fit your needs.

Do I use Sales Orders, Invoices or Sales Receipts?

Sales Orders are used to track orders that you have received but not shipped. They need to be converted to an Invoice or a Purchase Order in QuickBooks.

Invoices record the sale of an item to a customer, but they do not record the payment. The payment needs to be recorded in QuickBooks and applied against the invoice.

Sales Receipts are used to record the sale and the payment. This is often the easiest way to record your e-commerce sales.

Do I need to capture all of the customer information in QuickBooks?

I usually recommend not bringing customer information into QuickBooks. It often leads to a very confusing customer database if names are not entered exactly the same way, because you will end up with multiple records for the same customer.

QuickBooks is a great accounting system; it is not a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system. In most cases, you can set up a generic customer in QuickBooks for web orders to keep your QuickBooks data manageable.

How do I make sure I get accurate financial data?

Making sure your Chart of Accounts and Item List are set up correctly is critical when creating the accounting foundation of your business. Every business is different, but the key areas are:

• Income Accounts ? Make sure the Sales (Income) accounts are defined before you start downloading orders. If you want to track sales by different product lines of business or product type, consider using sub-accounts for your main sales account or perhaps using classes (in Premier or Enterprise) to separate product sales by type.
• Cost of Goods Sold ? Much like Sales, if you wish to separate the product cost by type, use sub-accounts or classes to distinguish them. Also, any cost related to the product (i.e. shipping costs) should have its own sub-account.
• Sales Taxes ? This can be a complete discussion in itself, but make sure you are capturing sales tax correctly and that you have the reporting necessary to provide accurate sales tax reporting. Every state is different and the rules are constantly changing, so you may to solicit advice from a local CPA or other reputable source.

We hope this gives you a good start on the basics of e-commerce accounting. In Part 2 of this series, we?ll get a little more in-depth. If you have questions Jim might be able to help with, let us know in the comments!

Source: http://www.bigcommerce.com/ecommerce-blog/e-commerce-accounting-faqs-part-1/

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Diverse Destinations For A Tiger Safari

One of the most enduringly popular animals to feature on wildlife watching holidays, the Tiger is a strikingly beautiful creature that can be sighted in a wide range of locations. With the adaptability that has allowed them to thrive in a number of different habitats, they have spread out over the Asian continent during the course of their evolution. Today, they can be found in 13 of the worlds countries: Bangladesh, Bhutan, Burma, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Nepal, Russia, Thailand and Vietnam. The most famous of these, and the one with the most options when it comes to choosing a Tiger safari, is India, but there are several other destinations that are equally awe-inspiring and intriguing in their own right, both in terms of environment and culture.

India

As a country which has the Tiger for its national animal, and which has in many ways been a leading light in conservation campaigns, India needs little introduction as a destination for those who wish to observe these majestic creatures in the wild. The countrys national parks are generally considered to be the best places in the world to watch them in their natural habitat and there are plenty of these parks to choose from. One of the most popular is Bandhavgarh National Park, thanks to its large Tiger population, while Kanha National Park is also a good place for sightings, and has a diverse range of other wildlife, which never fails to impress visitors. The forests of India are teeming with life, from big cats to brilliant birds, making any Tiger safari a true treat for wildlife lovers.

Nepal

Although sightings are not as common in Nepal as they are in India, the countrys wild population is on the rise thanks to sustained conservation efforts, and it is possible to see them while exploring the forests of national parks such as Chitwan and Bardia. These parks have high biodiversity and support a number of other impressive animals as well, including the Indian Rhino, Sambar and Sloth Bear. With a somewhat different range of wildlife than that found in Indias Tiger safari destinations, Nepal is well worth exploring.

Bhutan

A jewel of a Himalayan kingdom is to be found in Bhutan. The animals in Bhutan are adapted for high altitudes and mountain climates, with individuals having been seen at up to 4,000 metres above sea level; indeed, Bhutans most famous mountain monastery is popularly known as the Tigers Nest after an ancient legend tells of the animals dwelling in a cave there although the big cats are not to be found in that particular area today. A very different country to most places where Tigers live, Bhutan is known for its unique and independent culture, as well as for its spectacular unspoilt wilderness. While sightings are less frequent here than elsewhere in the region, a visit to Bhutans forests can be a wonderful next stop after a Tiger safari in India, offering a chance to see different side of Asia, not to mention a stunning range of endemic flora and colourful fauna.

Marissa Ellis-Snow is a freelance nature writer. If youre looking for a Tiger safari, Naturetrek specialises in expert-led natural history and wildlife tours worldwide. Naturetrek brings over 25 years of experience to to wildlife tours to some of the most spectacular regions on Earth.

Source: http://www.articlesnatch.com/Article/-Diverse-Destinations-For-A-Tiger-Safari/4459276

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Bucking party, GOP leaders sign pro-gay marriage brief

By Miranda Leitsinger, Staff Writer, NBC News

Supporters of same-sex marriage hope for a boost this week when dozens of high-profile Republicans, many no longer in office, submit their legal argument to the Supreme Court on why gays and lesbians should be allowed to wed, bucking their party's platform in a move that one who had a change of heart on the issue said would ?strengthen our nation as a whole.?

More than 80 Republicans have signed the brief to be filed in the case of Proposition 8, a California law banning same-sex marriage, according to the American Foundation for Equal Rights, which is waging the legal battle against the law. The nation?s high court will hear arguments in the case in late March.

Credit: Stephen Lam / Reuters file

Meg Whitman, HP's chief executive officer and president, at a meeting on Jan. 16. She says she has had a change of heart on the issue of gay marriage.

One scholar described the effort as ?inconceivable? just two years ago, and one of the signers, former California gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, said in a blog that she had changed her mind on the issue, ?like several others who have either sought or held public office, including President Obama.?

?As the Republican nominee for governor of California three years ago, I supported the majority of Californians who voted for Proposition 8 and against same sex marriage,? Whitman, president and chief executive officer of Hewlett-Packard Co., said in a statement. ?After careful review and reflection since then, I have come to embrace civil marriage for same sex couples.?

She noted in her blog that same-sex families ?should have equal access to the benefits of marriage? and later added: ?Establishing a constitutional right of marriage equality in California will strengthen our nation as a whole.?

Six former governors, including Jon Huntsman of Utah and Christine Todd Whitman of New Jersey, and members of President George W. Bush?s cabinet, such as former Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, four former and two current members of Congress signed the brief, AFER said. Members of the Mitt Romney and Sen. John McCain presidential campaigns also signed.

The brief will be filed Thursday, according to the Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights group.?Additional names were still being added to it, said AFER, which noted one of its lead attorneys on the case was a conservative, former U.S. Solicitor General Ted Olson, who argued for Bush before the Supreme Court after the disputed 2000 presidential election.?

Michael Klarman, a Harvard Law School professor and author of ?From the Closet to the Altar: Courts, Backlash, and the Struggle for Same-Sex Marriage,? called it an ?incredibly important development? and noted the brief could influence Justice Anthony Kennedy, whom he said was the swing vote on gay marriage.

?The fact that more and more Republicans are coming out in favor of gay marriage simply confirms how dramatic the shift in public opinion has been -- and that is a fact that likely is of great significance to Justice Kennedy,? he wrote to NBC News in an email. ?Even two years ago, it would have been inconceivable that this many prominent Republicans would have been willing to buck their party platform on the issue.?

In an article last week, former Republican presidential candidate Huntsman wrote that as governor he had backed civil unions but now was supporting marriage for gays and lesbians.

?The party of Lincoln should stand with our best tradition of equality and support full civil marriage for all Americans,? he wrote. ?This is both the right thing to do and will better allow us to confront the real choice our country is facing: a choice between the Founders? vision of a limited government that empowers free markets, with a level playing field giving opportunity to all, and a world of crony capitalism and rent-seeking by the most powerful economic interests.?

Huntsman?s argument echoed parts of the legal brief, which The New York Times?? first to report on the brief???said made the case that allowing same-sex marriage would promote conservative ideals of limited government and individual freedom as well as provide the children of gay couples?a two-parent home.

The legal brief was dismissed by the National Organization for Marriage, which on Monday pledged $500,000 to defeat Republican lawmakers supporting any law to allow same-sex marriage in Minnesota, a state considering such legislation.

?None of these people are actively in politics. They are not running for office because they know ? supporting same-sex marriage will end your career if you?re a Republican,? said Brian Brown, NOM's president. ?There?s overwhelming support for traditional marriage in the Republican Party, that?s why it?s part of the party platform, and any attempt by the establishment to redefine marriage and redefine what it means to be a conservative will mean the death of the Republican party.?

But LGBT groups said the brief was further proof of changing attitudes on the issue. Marc Solomon, national campaign director for Freedom to Marry who saw the brief, said the list included Republicans going back to the Reagan administration.

He noted Meg Whitman?s new position represented a ?significant shift,? while others who had signed, such as Republican Representatives Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida and Richard Hanna of New York, have also sponsored federal legislation that would repeal the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), which bars federal recognition of same-sex marriage.

Steve Schmidt, who worked on the 2004 Bush re-election effort and as chief strategist on McCain?s 2008 presidential bid, has been a ?powerful supporter? of same-sex marriage, Solomon said.

?I think most importantly, it?s the broad swath of leaders? on the list, Solomon told NBC News. ?We?re no longer just dealing with ? one or two ?mavericks? who are willing to sort of stick their neck out. ?

?This is a big swath of Republicans, of mainstream Republicans, who view the freedom to marry as part of their conservatism rather than something separate from it.?

The Supreme Court will also hear arguments in late March on DOMA, which the Obama administration has encouraged the justices to strike down. In its argument, the federal government noted that Proposition 8 and similar measures in other states was evidence that anti-gay discrimination remained a major problem.

Related:
US asks Supreme Court to strike down law denying benefits to same-sex couples
Supreme Court to take up same-sex marriage issue

Source: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/26/17102594-once-inconceivable-republican-leaders-sign-pro-gay-marriage-brief?lite

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Citrus shrimp linguine

Big, juicy shrimp made bright with a citrus sauce over a bowl of comforting pasta is just the thing to stay warm in the winter while hoping for the first signs of spring.

By Perre Coleman Magness,?The Runaway Spoon / February 26, 2013

Linguine serves as the perfect nest for big, juicy shrimp glazed with a citrus cream sauce.

The Runaway Spoon

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It?s winter. Generally, it?s cold and gray, though here in Memphis, the months are punctuated with weirdly frustrating days of 70 degree F. weather. I love winter food, but I have souped and stewed and braised myself silly and I?m ready for something lighter and fresher. This recipe started as just that. A quick whip-up with the last citrus at the bottom of the fruit bowl and some shrimp from the freezer.? But this good enough to share, and could not be a quicker family meal or company dish.

Skip to next paragraph Perre Coleman Magness

The Runaway Spoon

Perre Magness has studied food and cooking around the world, mostly by eating, but also through serious study. Coursework at Le Cordon Bleu London and intensive courses in Morocco, Thailand and France has broadened her own culinary skill and palate. The kitchen of choice is at home, cooking like most people, experimenting with unique but practical ideas.

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Big juicy shrimp remind me of summer, and citrus is sometimes the one spot of sunshine in the winter foodscape. Add a little garlic and fresh, leafy parsley and this is a bright, sunny dish. A touch of cream adds some body, but mostly this sauce just glazes the pasta and shrimp with zest. Use a high-quality olive oil to make sure the citrus really shines.

Citrus Shrimp Linguine

Serves 4

12 ounces linguine

1 orange

1 lemon

1 lime

3 garlic cloves

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

1/4 cup heavy cream

Small handful flat leaf parsley leaves, plus more for sprinkling

1 pound shrimp, peeled and deveined

Salt and pepper, to taste

Cook the linguine in a pot of well-salted water according to the package instructions. Drain the pasta, reserving a little of the cooking water.

Grate the zest of the orange, lemon, and lime into the carafe of a blender. Juice the citrus to produce 3/4 cup juice combined. Add the juice to the blender with the garlic, parsley, olive oil, cream, 1 teaspoon salt, and a few grinds of black pepper. Blend until smooth.

Pour the sauce into a large skillet or pot that will hold the pasta. Bring to a boil and cook for about 5 minutes until the sauce is slightly thickened. Add the shrimp and cook, turning once, until cooked through. They will be pink, firm, and curled tightly. Immediately add the pasta to the pot and a couple of tablespoons of cooking water. Use tongs to toss everything together, coating all the pasta with the sauce.

Serve immediately sprinkled with a little chopped fresh parsley.

The Christian Science Monitor has assembled a diverse group of food bloggers. Our guest bloggers are not employed or directed by The Monitor and the views expressed are the bloggers' own and they are responsible for the content of their blogs and their recipes. All readers are free to make ingredient substitutions to satisfy their dietary preferences, including not using wine (or substituting cooking wine) when a recipe calls for it. To contact us about a blogger, click here.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/C2DOWB8EJKU/Citrus-shrimp-linguine

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Researchers test holographic technique for restoring vision

Feb. 26, 2013 ? Researchers led by biomedical engineering Professor Shy Shoham of the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology are testing the power of holography to artificially stimulate cells in the eye, with hopes of developing a new strategy for bionic vision restoration.

Computer-generated holography, they say, could be used in conjunction with a technique called optogenetics, which uses gene therapy to deliver light-sensitive proteins to damaged retinal nerve cells. In conditions such as Retinitis Pigmentosa (RP) -- a condition affecting about one in 4000 people in the United States -- these light-sensing cells degenerate and lead to blindness.

"The basic idea of optogenetics is to take a light-sensitive protein from another organism, typically from algae or bacteria, and insert it into a target cell, and that photosensitizes the cell," Shoham explained.

Intense pulses of light can activate nerve cells newly sensitized by this gene therapy approach. But Shoham said researchers around the world are still searching for the best way to deliver the light patterns so that the retina "sees" or responds in a nearly normal way.

The plan is to someday develop a prosthetic headset or eyepiece that a person could wear to translate visual scenes into patterns of light that stimulate the genetically altered cells.

In their paper in the Feb. 26 issue of Nature Communications, the Technion researchers show how light from computer-generated holography could be used to stimulate these repaired cells in mouse retinas. The key, they say, is to use a light stimulus that is intense, precise, and can trigger activity across a variety of cells all at once.

"Holography, what we're using, has the advantage of being relatively precise and intense," Shoham said. "And you need those two things to see."

The researchers turned to holography after exploring other options, including laser deflectors and digital displays used in many portable projectors to stimulate these cells. Both methods had their drawbacks, Shoham said.

Digital light displays can stimulate many nerve cells at once, "but they have low light intensity and very low light efficiency," Shoham said. The genetically repaired cells are less sensitive to light than normal healthy retinal cells, so they preferably need a bright light source like a laser to be activated.

"Lasers give intensity, but they can't give the parallel projection" that would simultaneously stimulate all of the cells needed to see a complete picture, Shoham noted. "Holography is a way of getting the best of both worlds."

The researchers have tested the potential of holographic stimulation in retinal cells in the lab, and have done some preliminary work with the technology in living mice with damaged retinal cells. The experiments show that holography can provide reliable and simultaneous stimulation of multiple cells at millisecond speeds.

But implementing a holographic prosthesis in humans is far in the future, Shoham cautioned.

His team is exploring other ways, aside from optogenetics, to activate damaged nerve cells. For instance, they are also experimenting with ultrasound for activating retinal and brain tissue.

And Shoham said holography itself "also provides a very interesting path toward three-dimensional stimulation, which we don't use so much in the retina, but is very interesting in other projects where it allow us to stimulate 3-D brain tissue."

In mid-February, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the first artificial retina and retinal prosthesis, which works in a different fashion than the Technion project. The FDA-approved device, the Argus II, uses an artificial "retina" consisting of electrodes, and a glasses-like prosthesis to transmit light signals to the electrodes.

"I think Shy's lab is very smart to pursue many methods of restoring vision," said Eyal Margalit, a retinal disease specialist at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. He said researchers around the world are also looking for ways to use stem cells to replace damaged retinal cells, to transplant entire layers of healthy retinal cells, and in some cases "bypass the eye entirely, and stimulate the cortex of the brain directly" to restore lost vision.

Shoham's co-authors on the paper included Dr. Inna Reutsky-Gefen, Lior Golan, Dr. Nairouz Farah, Adi Schejter, Limor Tsur, and Dr. Inbar Brosh.

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Story Source:

The above story is reprinted from materials provided by American Technion Society. The original article was written by Kevin Hattori.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

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Journal Reference:

1. Inna Reutsky-Gefen, Lior Golan, Nairouz Farah, Adi Schejter, Limor Tsur, Inbar Brosh, Shy Shoham. Holographic optogenetic stimulation of patterned neuronal activity for vision restoration. Nature Communications, 2013; 4: 1509 DOI: 10.1038/ncomms2500

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/strange_science/~3/G1QOPaftAZc/130226134259.htm

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Super Troopers 2 May Film This Year

It's kind of amazing that the world has yet to see a sequel to Super Troopers. Sure, Broken Lizard, the comedy troupe behind it all, never saw quite the same the critical and box office success after?its cop comedy hit the scene back in 2002 (though Beerfest came close in the box office department), but that just makes the film's nonexistence all the more anomalous. You'd think that after a few films failed to hit,?the troupe would?fall back into the safety net that is Super Troopers, but despite rumblings over the years that the members?had ideas for it, that never happened. It might soon, though.

Broken Lizard members Kevin Heffernan and Steve Lemme (Farva and Mac, respectively) recently did an interview with the site Guy Speed?[Via Screen Crush] to promote an upcoming comedy special, and they revealed where they're finally at with the sequel:

?There will be a Super Troopers sequel. We put it off for a while and then came back to it. We wrote the script and handed it in to Fox and now we?re just negotiating the time and the place and hopefully shoot it some time this year. I have to start growing my mustache now.?

That's good news if you're hoping to see the Broken Lizard gang put on the state trooper uniforms once again. Assuming Fox does actually move forward with the project, that is.

We're sure a Super Troopers sequel has the potential to be a big hit a decade later (the film's still a riot after many, many, many rewatches), but given the gang's recent track record, it's understandable if all involved want to make sure that everything is in tip-top shape before pulling the trigger. If it isn't, and they do go ahead, a Super Troopers 2 failure may put the final nail in Broken Lizard's coffin.

But what say you? Do you even want a Super Troopers 2 all these years later?

Follow along on Twitter: @PeterSHall and @Moviesdotcom.

Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1926924/news/1926924/

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Family missing at sea: An unsolved mystery (+video)

Family missing at sea: A family of four, including two children, issued a distress call from their sailboat Sunday. But they're still missing at sea. Who are they? Where are they?

By Staff,?Associated Press / February 26, 2013

The family radioed for help, from a position 68 miles off the coast of Monterey, Calif.

Authorities have turned to the public in hopes of identifying a family that sent a series of distress calls saying their boat was sinking far off the Central California coast.

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"There is still no information on where the boat was coming from, where it was going or who the people on board are," said Coast?Guard Chief Petty Officer Mike Lutz.

The unidentified family of four ? including two children under 8 ? had been sailing a small vessel Sunday west of Monterey Bay. Forecasters had issued a weekend advisory warning boaters of rough seas in the area, and water temperatures typically are in the 40s and 50s, making long-term survival difficult.

The group made its first distress call late Sunday afternoon, Coast?Guard Lt. Heather Lampert said. Investigators used the boat's radio signal and radar to determine the call came from an area about 60 miles west of Monterey.

The boaters reported that their 29-foot sailboat was taking on water and the electronics were failing.

Crews planned to search by sea and air through the night Monday to find the family, who said in the calls that they were fashioning a raft from a cooler and a life-preserver ring before they lost contact with the Coast?Guard.

"We will just saturate the search area with as many assets as we can, so we can hopefully rescue them," Lutz said.

The Coast?Guard released one of the family's recorded distress calls (http://bit.ly/W90cyv ), in hopes that it would lead to new information from the public that could help in the search. So far the agency has received no reports of missing persons in the case.

The agency believes the boat's name was Charmblow. In the crackling recording, a man's voice is heard saying, "Coast?Guard, Coast?Guard, we are abandoning ship. This is the (Charmblow), we are abandoning ship."

Investigators determined from the broken distress calls that the family included a husband and wife, their 4-year-old son and his cousin, Lampert said.

The boat's location initially was reported farther north, but Lampert said investigators now believe the call came from west of Monterey Bay, about 100 miles south of San Francisco. The boat did not have a working GPS system.

Calls to harbors in California have failed to locate the boat, and database searches have come up empty, Lampert said. The Coast?Guard was expanding its search to Hawaii, the Seattle area and north into Canada.

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/9jNOvSL1eQk/Family-missing-at-sea-An-unsolved-mystery-video

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Tibetan monks self-immolate in anti-China protest

BEIJING (AP) ? Two Tibetan monks in their early 20s set themselves on fire in protest against Chinese rule near dozens of pilgrims who had gathered for prayers to mark the end of the Tibetan New Year festival, a Tibet rights group said. Both died. A third monk was taken to a hospital after setting himself alight in a separate incident, another group reported. His condition and whereabouts weren't immediately known.

The self-immolations bring the total reported since 2009 to 107.

One of the monks, Tsesung Kyab, self-immolated Monday outside a temple in Luqu county in northwestern Gansu province while the other, Phagmo Dundrup, set himself ablaze Sunday at a monastery in neighboring Qinghai province, the Washington, D.C.-based International Campaign for Tibet reported.

It said large numbers of religious pilgrims had gathered at both monasteries for prayer ceremonies to commemorate the end of the Tibetan new year festival, Losar. The group said it received images of the self-immolation in Luqu in which pilgrims watched as Tsesung Kyab burned.

The third monk, Sandhag, set himself on fire in the main street in the town of Aba in an ethnically Tibetan area of Sichuan province on Monday morning, according to London-based Free Tibet.

Police extinguished the flames and took Sandhag to a hospital, the group said. A resident of the local Dhupu monastery, he has since been moved to another unknown location, it said.

Last week, two Tibetan teenagers set themselves on fire in a double self-immolation in Aba prefecture, Tibet rights advocacy groups said. Seventeen-year-old Richen and his childhood friend Sonam Dargye, 18, were among the youngest to have died in the fiery protests.

The protests have continued despite an intensified crackdown in Tibetan areas by Chinese authorities hoping to stop the self-immolations. Authorities have detained and jailed Tibetans they accuse of helping others self-immolate, an act that Beijing now considers a crime. Tibet and adjoining ethnically Tibetan regions have been sealed-off to most outsiders, making independent confirmation of the self-immolations virtually impossible.

A woman who answered the phone at the Communist Party's propaganda department in Gannan prefecture, which oversees Luqu county, said she was unaware of the reported self-immolation, while county officials could not be reached. Authorities in Qinghai's Haidong prefecture, where the second protest took place, either could not be reached or said they had no information on the case.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/tibetan-monks-self-immolate-anti-china-protest-011846664.html

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You Can Download Adobe Photoshop Touch for Your iPhone or Android Phone Now

If you've been waiting the cold long year to get Photoshop on your iPhone or Android Phone, the wait is finally over. Photoshop Touch for iPhone and Android is now available for $5. More »

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/k85yooqTY-s/you-can-download-adobe-photoshop-touch-for-your-iphone-or-android-phone-now

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Obama to meet leading Republicans McCain, Graham on Tuesday

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama will meet leading Senate Republicans John McCain and Lindsey Graham on Tuesday to discuss immigration reform efforts and could also delve into across-the-board spending cuts set to take effect on Friday.

Obama's meeting with the two U.S. senators, part of a bipartisan "Gang of Eight" working to craft immigration legislation, was described by a White House official on Monday as focused on that issue.

But a McCain aide said the White House encounter likely would go beyond immigration and could include the looming $85 billion in government spending reductions that will hit domestic programs and the Pentagon unless a last-minute deal is reached.

The White House escalated a campaign on Monday to convince Americans dire consequences await if the so-called "sequester" cuts go ahead on March 1, warning of a slowdown in global trade, a stalled fight against cancer and compromised border security.

But there was no word that Obama was ready to start negotiations. Graham is a member of Senate committees on appropriations and the federal budget. He and McCain both sit on the armed services panel. The McCain aide said the U.S. troop drawdown from Afghanistan could also be discussed on Tuesday.

The planned meeting marks Obama's latest outreach to some of the Republicans involved in negotiating an overhaul of the U.S. immigration system.

Facing criticism for not getting more involved in the delicate process on Capitol Hill, Obama phoned McCain, Graham and Senator Marco Rubio last week. It was not immediately known why Rubio, a rising Cuban-American star in his party and considered crucial to winning conservative backing for any reform deal, was not scheduled to participate on Tuesday.

Obama backs the Senate reform effort but he and the Republicans differ over some key details.

Obama emphasized in his recent State of the Union address the importance of creating a clear path to citizenship for the estimated 11 million immigrants in the United States illegally.

Many Republicans stress that there must first be measurable progress in securing U.S. borders, a condition hard for the president to accept if it drags out the legalization process.

The White House, however, is counting on Republicans feeling pressure to move swiftly on immigration reform after they were chastened by Latino voters' rejection in the November election.

(The story corrects million to billion in paragraph 3)

(Reporting By Matt Spetalnick; Editing by Doina Chiacu)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-meet-leading-republicans-mccain-graham-tuesday-005836042.html

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Entrepreneurial bug bites San Quentin inmates

SAN QUENTIN, California (Reuters) - One by one, the entrepreneurs, clad in crisp blue jeans and armed with PowerPoint presentations, stood before a roomful of investors and tech bloggers to explain their dreams of changing the world.

For these exuberant times in Silicon Valley, the scene was familiar; the setting, less so.

With the young and ambitious flocking again to northern California to launch Internet companies, there were signs one recent morning that startup mania has taken hold even behind the faded granite walls of California's most notorious prison.

"Live stream has gone mainstream. Mobile video usage went up and is expected to increase by 28 percent over the next five years," said Eddie Griffin, who was pitching a music streaming concept called "At the Club" and happens to be finishing a third stint for drug possession at San Quentin State Prison, near San Francisco, after spending the last 15 years behind bars.

Griffin was one of seven San Quentin inmates who presented startup proposals on "Demo Day" as part of the Last Mile program, an entrepreneurship course modeled on startup incubators that take in batches of young companies and provide them courses, informal advice and the seed investments to grow.

According to business news website Xconomy, incubator programs - which it tracks - have tripled in number for each of the past three years, proliferating from Sao Paulo to Stockholm at a pace that has fueled talk in tech circles of an "incubator bubble".

Last Mile founder Chris Redlitz, a local venture capitalist, says his goal was never to seek out a genuine investment opportunity inside a prison but to educate inmates about tech entrepreneurship and bridge the knowledge gap between Silicon Valley's wired elite and the rest of the region's population.

Inmates, after all, are not allowed to run businesses. They do not have access to cellphones ? much less Apple Inc's latest iPhone developer toolkits ? and they use computers only under close supervision.

A LOT TO LEARN

After his presentation in San Quentin's chapel, which received a rousing reception from an audience that included prison warden Kevin R. Chappell, Griffin told a reporter it was unlikely he would launch his startup idea immediately after being released this summer.

"I still have a lot to learn," said the soft-spoken Detroit native. "I've never used a cellphone. Technology is kind of foreign in this environment."

But to hear the inmates use jargon such as "lean startup" and "minimum viable product" speaks to an unmistakable truth about the Bay Area zeitgeist, where startups, for better or worse, have come to embody upward mobility, ambition, and hustle.

"If they were doing this in the '80s there may have been a different theme or model," said Wade Roush, Xconomy's chief correspondent. "But in this day and age, becoming an entrepreneur or starting a business is a form of self-actuation."

Situated on prime waterfront land, San Quentin is perhaps California's most storied prison and home to the state's only death row. But it has also kept a longstanding progressive reputation, boasting a rare college degree-granting program and vibrant arts courses.

The Last Mile accepted 10 inmates out of 50 applicants for its latest batch. The program, which graduated its first class of inmates last year, meets twice a week to discuss startups and lasts six months, although the most recent class took seven months due to a prison lockdown last year.

Some Last Mile participants, under official supervision, have also joined the online question-and-answer site Quora to respond to questions about prison life or describe what it felt like to commit murder.

The latest batch of startup ideas included a fitness app that would motivate drug addicts to exercise, a cardiovascular health organization, a social network for sufferers of post-traumatic stress disorder, a food waste recycling program, and an e-commerce site for artists in prison.

DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE

Because the likelihood is not great that these companies will become funded and succeed, Redlitz said he was also working to place the inmates in jobs at tech companies after their release.

Rocketspace, a startup co-working space in downtown San Francisco, has agreed to host an internship. Rally.org, a crowd-funding site that counts Redlitz among its investors, said it hoped to begin a program to seek micro-investments from the public for the inmates' ideas.

Sitting in the Demo Day audience was John Collison, the 22-year-old co-founder of online payments startup Stripe, who noted some stark differences between the inmates' proposals and the fashionable startups du jour in Silicon Valley.

"What's frustrating is that all these companies in the Valley, they're ideas for the 1 or 10 percent," Collison said. "You have startups like Uber or Taskrabbit, that's like, ?Oh, here's something to help you find a driver or find someone to clean your house.' Are they solving real problems?"

The San Quentin inmates "were talking about urban obesity, or PTSD", Collison said. "It's a completely different perspective. We actually really need that."

(Reporting by Gerry Shih; Editing by Dale Hudson)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/inmates-high-tech-startup-mania-hits-san-quentin-140717846--sector.html

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SES New York Keynote Speaker Says Internet is TV's Best Friend ...

The Internet didn?t kill TV! According to Mike Proulx, the Internet has become TV?s best friend. Proulx will be the opening keynote speaker at SES New York 2013. The leading event for experienced marketing and advertising professionals will take place March 25-28, 2013, at the New York Marriott Marquis.

Proulx is a Senior Vice President and the Director of Social Media at Hill Holliday, a renowned advertising agency based in Boston, where he leads a team with a focus on cross-channel integration, emerging and social media. He has spent the last 17 years working at various interactive, high-tech, and new media companies on the agency-side, client-side, and as an entrepreneur. He has spoken at dozens of events and has been widely featured in the press including The New York Times, Fast Company, TV Guide, Forbes, BusinessWeek, Mashable, BuzzFeed, and NPR.

Proulx conceived, produced, directed, and co-host the TVnext summit, which took place in early 2011 and 2012. He is the co-author of Social TV, a best-selling book from Wiley publishing that launched in February of 2012. He is also the host of the social TV web series, ?The Pulse on Lost Remote?. He holds a Master?s degree in Computer Information Systems from Bentley University and in 2012 was named the Ad Club?s Media All Star.

His opening keynote is titled, ?Social TV: How Marketers Can Reach and Engage Audiences by Connecting Television to the Web, Social Media, and Mobile.?

Search Engine Watch (SEW) asked Mike Proulx (MP) five questions about his upcoming keynote. Here are his answers:

SEW: How does the convergence of television with the web, social media, and mobile change our behaviors and shake up our long standing beliefs about TV?

MP: There are those who believe that television is a traditional medium with an impending death. The web, social media, and mobile have evolved TV into a multi-screen experience that transcends devices. Not only are we watching more television than ever before, we?re interacting with programming on the ?second screen? in ways that enrich storylines and bring us together to virtually co-view. The modern era of television is a new media that?s more social, more connected, and more portable?and because of this TV is more alive than it?s ever been.

SEW: How has social media created a new and powerful "backchannel" and why does this fuel the renaissance of live broadcasts?

MP: There are a ton of posts happening in social media about any given TV show as it airs. Since Twitter is open and public, it acts as television?s backchannel filled with real-time commentary and conversation ? And it?s not just about TV series but also TV commercials giving producers and marketers instant feedback about their content. Live television events are seeing some of the highest ratings in years and social media brings a level of community and connection to TV watching the likes of which the medium has never before experienced.

SEW: Can you give us some examples of how mobile devices allow us to watch and interact with television whenever and wherever we want?

MP: Tablets, smartphones, and laptops enable television?s portability but it?s apps like HBO Go, ABC Player, Xfinity Remote, and CNN that deliver ?TV? content via those devices. And in the 4G world of mobile, we can watch TV in places once inconceivable. My favorite spot? Laying out on the roof deck on a warm summer night with my iPad in hand streaming HBO?s The Newsroom.

SEW: Why would ?connected TVs? blend web and television content into a unified big screen experience that will bring us back into our living rooms?

MP: Apple TV, Roku, Boxee TV, Google TV, Samsung Smart TVs, etc. stream online video (that was once relegated to our computer screens) onto the ?big screen? of our living rooms. HD YouTube clips suddenly come to life in ways that are far more impactful and dynamic than tiny smartphone screens further blurring the lines of what?s ?TV.? While the notion of TV everywhere lets us watch TV at will regardless of our physical location, the increasingly seamless ability to channel streaming video through the TV set makes the living room that much more compelling.

SEW: With the television landscape changing, why should brands approach the medium once labeled ?traditional? as new media?

MP: TV has become mashed up with the Web, social media, and mobile. Television networks, providers, brands, and agencies must continue to unshackle themselves from dated business and advertising models and rediscover television as a new medium. This means planning television and digital together to tell stories across devices and engage viewers with TV experiences not just TV shows. The speed, scale, and degree of change that has and is happening create enormous opportunity for those brands who have the courage to innovate.

SES New York 2013 offers a variety of conference passes and on-site training. If you register by Thursday, March 7, 2013, you can save up to $600 on Platinum or All Access passes.

For more information, click on Rates and Registration Details. Group discounts for 4 or more pass holders from the same company are also available by contacting [email?protected] and are the best value for the lowest price possible.

I should disclose that SES New York is a client of my agency. But, trust me, TV is not dead yet.

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Source: http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2250850/SES-New-York-Keynote-Speaker-Says-Internet-is-TVs-Best-Friend

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